German retail investors showed a marked preference for balanced funds at the expense of equities in March, figures from the country’s trade body suggest.
The BVI data shows that net flows for Germany’s open-ended retail funds industry favoured balanced funds, which collected €1.9 billion during the month.
At the same time, investors withdrew €1.3 billion from equity exchange-traded funds and €1.1 billion from active equity funds.
The inflows to balanced products were “significantly more” than in February, the BVI said, when these funds had raised €600 million.
“Falling prices at the stock exchanges” in March were behind the pattern of flows for new business in equity funds, the BVI added.
On a net basis during the month, the country’s open-ended retail funds business recorded outflows of €1.2 billion – though this contrasts with €12.4 billion of year-to-date inflows at the end of March.
The data includes funds not only domiciled in Germany, but wider funds including cross-border and so-called “roundtrip” funds that are collected in Germany.
Including other funds such as retail closed-end funds and ‘Spezialfonds’ for institutions, Germany’s funds industry saw €38 billion of total inflows from January through to the end of March, which the BVI said was more than the annual average seen in this period (€31 billion) in each of the last ten years.
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